


Idle Hands

by lodessa



Series: Janeway/Chakotay Tumblr Prompts [28]
Category: Star Trek: Voyager
Genre: Domestic Fluff, F/M, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-19
Updated: 2018-08-19
Packaged: 2019-06-29 16:46:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 728
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15733443
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lodessa/pseuds/lodessa
Summary: Chakotay returns home from a conference to find the house torn apart.





	Idle Hands

**Author's Note:**

> **Written to the prompt:** “You had a business trip and I missed you so much that I kind of tore up the house in your absence like a dog with separation anxiety… sorry? AU”. And like, I can’t even decide who in J/C would do this. Both of them?

All the lights are dark as Chakotay trudges up the path to the house, and he can barely contain the feeling of disappointment as he realizes that means she must not be there. 

It’s been ten days and they’ve been comming but it’s not the same. After all those years working together every day but not being together, he hadn’t thought about the very real alternate problem of being together but getting to spend everyday together, but it’s definitely been hitting him hard now that he’s been off planet at a conference without her this last week and a half. 

He wouldn’t have asked her to wait around for him to get home, but she’d known he was getting back this afternoon and he’d hoped… well he’d hoped she’d missed him at least a fraction of how much he missed her.

He shoves aside the paranoid thought that she isn’t just out of the house at the moment, that she’s left it and him permanently. There’s no reason to think that.

Reaching the front door he keys in the code and walks in. Strangely the automatic lights do not come on. That’s odd. He goes to turn them on manually, but they don’t respond to that either. The power must be off, but the neighbors had lights on so it can only be their house. 

“Kathryn?” he calls out, thinking she might be home after all, but she doesn’t respond. A different sort of dread fills him at the thought: What if some disaster has happened? What if someone sabotaged the power and then ambushed Kathryn?

Trying to reassure himself it is probably something much more mundane, he fishes a flashlight out of the drawer in the kitchen and goes searching for her.

It’s a good thing he pulled out the flashlight; because, he nearly trips in several places where things are out of place, access hatches open and wires exposed. Something is definitely not as it should be.

He finally finds her, legs sticking halfway out of an access panel in their bedroom, cursing at something inside.

“Kathryn!” he exclaims, “What’s going on? What happened to the power? Are you alight?”

“I’m fine, Chakotay…” she emerges covered in dust and grease, “I must have lost track of time… Sorry about the mess.”

He embraces her anyway, lifting her off the floor a little, relief and excitement mixing together.

“The lights weren’t working and you didn’t respond and I worried… What is all this?”

“I may have blown some fuses while doing some upgrades to our electrical system.”

“Upgrades? What was wrong with our electrical system? And why didn’t you just call B’Elanna?”

“I…” she looks a little embarrassed, “Honestly I just needed something to do to keep myself from going a bit crazy… crazier waiting for you to get back.”

“You tore up all our wiring because you missed me?” he says, not sure whether to be filled with awe that she cares that much or laugh at the ridiculousness.

“I meant to clean it all up before you got back. I just maybe got a bit overambitious.”

That is certainly Kathryn. She’s always been prone to biting off more than any one person could possibly chew.

“You know, most people just read a book to distract themselves when they are bored.”

“Says the man who took the bathroom down to the studs to remodel last time I was out of down for more than two days,” she points out.

“Did you not like your new bathtub?” he teases.

“I did, when you finished it a week and a half after I got back and I stopped having to use the showers at the headquarters gym. Ugh. I have to clean up this mess.”

“We can deal with it tomorrow,” he tells her, not wanting to let her go as he wraps his arms more securely around her, resting his chin on the top of her head, “Maybe next time we can go together.”

“Yeah I’m sure the academy is just going to let you take off whenever I have to.”

“I’m going to develop a new course: Applied Intro to Command,” he chuckles, “students get to follow Starfleet’s brightest and best admiral around and see what the job really looks like.”

“Why don’t you follow me, and I’ll show you what missing you really looks like."


End file.
